Overall, Mexico has taken the measure of the challenge that must be met if it is to reverse the severe
environmental degradation confronting it. In the last few years, it has undertaken fundamental environmental reforms
and launched new policies and programmes that are going in the right direction and in many ways are exemplary.
However, it will take time as well as considerable and sustained effort for these new measures to be firmly
embedded in environmental management practice. Ensuring funding and continuity in the implementation of the
reforms at national level will be essential. Putting integrated pollution control into effect will require both a cultural
shift on the part of managers, who until now have dealt exclusively with water or air pollution, and an increase in the
environmental awareness and know-how of small industry. For decentralisation and devolution to be effective,
institutional capacity at state and municipal level needs to be built up progressively, and these lower levels of
government must acquire greater financial autonomy for managing their environment. Environmental information
and education programmes should be expanded to further buttress these changes.